West Virginia head coach Ross Hodge on Maryland men's basketball ahead of Sunday's scrimmage

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After controlling the exhibition game against Georgia Tech at UMBC on Sunday, Maryland men's basketball will host West Virginia for the second public scrimmage, set for 3 PM on Sunday.

Maryland will get another look at what is expected to be a more talented rotation in year two under head coach Buzz Williams, while the expectation is that Tomislav Buljan makes his unofficial debut in College Park against WVU after being sidelined with a minor injury last weekend.

Yet Maryland will also face a tougher test with the Mountaineers headed to campus.

"Really good blend of experienced guards and youthful talent. [Pharrel] Payne is a load," WVU head coach Ross Hodge said. "He can hurt you in a lot of different areas. Their physicality on the perimeter, like you said, with [DJ] Wagner and [Bishop] Boswell, is different than kind of what we scrimmaged last year. And they have a trial run [against Georgia Tech] under their belt. [Buzz Williams'] teams have always made a big jump year one to year two. I anticipate that just kind of watching them. They're physical. They're playing really hard. They're tough. They're deep and it'll be a heck of a challenge."

Andre Mills was highlighted as one who impressed Hodge when the two teams held a 'secret scrimmage' ahead of the 2025-26 season.

"I was impressed right away for that, just his physicality, his toughness, his willingness to stick his nose in there and make tough plays as a young player. That kind of typically jumps out and just knowing those guys and kind of following their seasons, you saw him continue to get better and better and he played great the other night. Again, he's really bought in."

West Virginia was picked to finish tied for eighth with Cincinnati in the annual Big 12 preseason coaches poll, while head coach Ross Hodge will look to build on an 18-14 (9-10) finish in 2025-26, his first year with the program. Freshman Miles Sadler and Joson Sanon, two brief Maryland targets, are expected to start in 2026-27, while West Virginia is awaiting a resolution regarding the eligibility status of forward Javan Buchanan and Brenen Lorient ahead of opening night.

Hodge admitted the exhibition matchup allows the Mountaineers a chance to work out "certain lineup combinations," something Maryland can also offer with so many pieces still meshing together ahead of a hopeful bounceback season. Hodge, meanwhile, knows what he's looking to see on Sunday while noting his focus is "how the heck are we going to keep [Pharrel] Payne off the offensive glass? And how are we going to keep [Andre] Mills out of the paint?"

"What are our huddles like, what is our bench going to be like during timeouts, how are we going to handle when things don't go our way? The things that we've preached pretty much since the moment we got here, we'll be a bigger judgement on my end on how the day goes than solely what the scoreboard says. How do we communicate with each other? How do they respond to a negative call? How do they respond to me jumping on them? That's ultimately how I'll judge it if it was a successful day or not."

Hodge admitted he been able to see Buzz's career progress.

"Just from being a really young junior college coach and kind of watching his trajectory from a similar path -- JuCo student assistant at Navaro and then think he went to Oklahoma City and Texas A&M Kingsville and UTA and his just kind of knowing his story. And our paths crossing along the way when I was a junior college coach, he would recruit some of our guys when he was at New Orleans. And then as an assistant at Texas A&M. And somebody like [that] we'll exchange pleasantries if we see each other on the road and things like that, but not somebody that we're in constant communication like throughout the year."

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